


it is a good refrain

by allthelight



Category: His Dark Materials (TV), His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, F/M, Gen, Pre-Canon, Unresolved Tension, a little bit of protective dad asriel, but basically marisa and asriel being their usual selves to each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 11:22:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22495273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allthelight/pseuds/allthelight
Summary: “Would you do it again?”He felt his forehead pucker. A low, warning growl emitted from Stelmaria’s throat. “Do what?”“Kill for her.”Asriel looked at her, the woman he once thought he loved, with disbelief. It felt as though he never knew her at all. “You always do this, don’t you know? You ask questions that you are already perfectly aware of the answer to.”Marisa has questions for Asriel about things she cannot yet understand. Pre-canon.
Relationships: Lord Asriel/Marisa Coulter
Comments: 6
Kudos: 67





	it is a good refrain

**Author's Note:**

> it looks like i'm just posting one thing a week and tbh i'm enjoying it so let's see how long it goes!
> 
> this is probably quite similar to my other fic 'things my heart used to know' but it's a lot more about how they feel for Lyra rather than how they feel for each other, though there's definitely that in there, too. 
> 
> i also know that Marisa never really hated Lyra, but I think she thought she did, that she must, and she just doesn't really get it.
> 
> song and title from 'on the radio' by Regina Spektor.

_No, this is how it works_

_You peer inside yourself_

_You take the things you like_

_And try to love the things you took_

_And then you take that love you made_

_And stick it into_

_Someone else's heart_

_Pumping someone else's blood_

_And walking arm in arm_

_You hope it don't get harmed_

_But even if it does_

_You'll just do it all again_

_-x-_

They met again when the sun was high in the sky and the floodwater had receded. It was high summer and the grass around Jordan College was green and lush. Birds sung high in the trees and he was walking away from all of it when he heard a voice call to him from the shadows.

“Well, well, well,” it said, stepping out from underneath the trees. “Look who we have here.”

Asriel tensed, hand immediately going to Stelmaria’s head, fingers curling in the fur. “What are you doing here?”

Marisa shook out her curls, her hat staying perfectly in place on her head. It was three years since he last saw her; back then still with the slight softness in her belly that contrasted completely with the hardness in her eyes. Betrayal suited her, it seemed. She looked as well as she ever did.

She cocked her head to the side. “I’m here for the same reason you are. To watch.”

“You should go,” he said, angry now that the shock had worn off. She haunted his dreams and stole his thoughts but seeing her in the flesh was something entirely different and unexpected.

“Or what?”

His jaw began to ache. He felt a muscle twitch at the side. “Or I’ll make you wish you’d never been born.”

“Oh Asriel,” she laughed, like pearls on a string. “So dramatic. But you don’t need to worry. You’ve already done that, haven’t you?”

He had nothing to say – the places where words resided in his mind was suddenly empty – and in lieu of that he simply studied her. She didn’t look as well as he had first thought. The makeup was perfectly set, the hair had not dared move from its original position and her clothes were as impeccable as ever but it was something else that let him know that she was not quite the Marisa he had once known. There were fine lines around her eyes, a certain downturn at the corner of her mouth, and while she seemed perfectly calm, he could sense that there was something very fine holding her together, and if pulled tight then it would snap.

Marisa didn’t wait for him to answer. Her face changed. The golden monkey stopped looking at Stelmaria and looked up at his human instead. “Is she well?”

 _Lyra._ He’d only seen her for a moment, too afraid to go any closer and be noticed by her. She’d been playing with the son of one of the servants, running around on legs that still had to lose their toddler chubbiness. She’d be coming up to four soon. He’d left a birthday gift with the librarian to give to her on the day itself. Not that she’d ever know it was from him, of course. He told himself it didn’t matter, which it didn’t, and if he told himself that often enough then eventually, he’d believe it.

“Why do you care?” He sneered, feeling a growl from Stelmaria as it vibrated through his hand still in her fur.

She made a noise in the back of her throat, a mewl of some kind that he had never heard her make before. “I don’t.”

“You should go,” he warned. He had a train to catch and the last thing he wanted to do was get caught up in her once again.

She held up a finger. “Oh, I will. I just have a question before I do.”

“You lost the right to ask any questions a long time ago,” he said lowly, not seeing the Marisa of now but the Marisa of back then, with the blank face and the insistence that she knew of nothing and had known of nothing and wanted nothing to do with him, either of them, anymore.

“But indulge me,” she said, voice smooth like honey. “Just this once.”

The rest of her remained the same but her eyes had changed. The walls had cracked, just a little, but it allowed him to see through.

“Fine,” he sighed. “Ask your question. Then you have to leave. I don’t want you here.”

“You make it sound as though I want to be here.”

“You want something,” he said. “You always do.”

Once upon a time all he wanted was _her._ Too late he had seen his mistake. It was foolish to want just one singular thing. If anybody knew it then they could make sure you never got it. It was more sensible to want multiple. He told himself that, too.

“I want to know what you see in her,” Marisa said, voice unexpectedly thoughtful. It wasn’t the question she wanted to ask, he knew, not at all, but it was the one she did. Her eyes had lost their playful glint and there was something sombre in them, leaking out of that fragile space.

“In who?” He asked foolishly. Stelmaria glanced up at him. There was no need for it to be voiced, this disarray that they both felt. Marisa Coulter and her golden monkey seemed to render them something entirely different than who they normally were.

“In _her._ ” Marisa’s eyes darted left and right, as if making sure they were alone. “Lyra.”

Instantly every cell in Asriel’s body was alert. The act of hearing her name, the act of doing so this close to the college had that effect on him. Marisa had never said their daughter’s name before. _Their daughter._ An unbelievable statement. Sentimentality came dangerously close to overpowering reason in his mind, and instead of telling her to get lost, instead of going for her throat as he ought to have done, he stayed standing where he was and said, “I don’t want to talk about Lyra.”

“You said one question, Asriel. It’s all I ask.”

Stelmaria ventured forward, the golden monkey did, too. Asriel could feel her pull, her longing to go further still. He wondered if Marisa felt the same, if indeed she still felt anything at all.

He scoffed, no longer willing to co-operate. “You have no right to ask anything at all.”

Immediately the space vanished in her eyes and something returned to them. They were on familiar ground, now. It was easier to hate than it had been to love.

“Don’t you even _dare_ ,” she hissed, voice crackling like the way the air did before lightning. “You don’t get to tell me what rights I have. Not when you took all of them.”

“When _I_ took all of them?” Stelmaria came back to his side; he felt her warm body press against his thigh. “ _I?”_

“I lost everything because of you. My husband, my status, my power. I fell right to the bottom and it was all because of the mess you made for the girl.”

“What about me? What about what I lost? You lost status, yes, but you did not always have such a thing. I lost things that were my own, that belonged to me. My rank and privileges, my land and my money.”

“Oh, I do apologise, _Lord_ Asriel-”

“I am still a Lord yes, but an empty one. It is nothing but a meaningless title.”

“Yet one you still have,” Marisa said, stepping closer. The monkey dared to look hopeful. “If it had not been for the girl then we would still have all of these things, would we not? We would still have it all.”

Asriel’s heart thumped painfully in his chest, in a way that it hadn’t done in a long time. It made it harder to smother it. “The girl? Why must you always bring it back to her?”

“You lost everything because of her and yet you do not hate her, you do not blame her for it. Why?”

Her voice was smooth, her tone light, but he could see that there was a genuine question, and he understood at once what had happened. She had not intended to ask this today, she had not intended to ask this at all, but it had spilled out between them, the way so many things had in the past. Looking at her it was impossible to be distant, to forget all those things that had happened. He hated her and he loved her all at once and it was possibly the most dizzying thing he had ever experienced.

“She was not the one who turned her back on me,” he said, voice deceptively quiet. “She didn’t stand by and say nothing as they took it all. Things that were mine by birth and by right. Things that had nothing to do with you at all.”

Marisa simply blinked at him, as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “All I did,” she started, voice as quiet as his, “was try to save myself from the mess that you made.”

He wanted to bite out at her that he should never have bothered, that he should have spared himself the effort, but he couldn’t bring himself to lie.

“Yes, well you certainly did that, didn’t you? I hear you’re embarking on quite the adventure.” He shook his head in disbelief. “The Magisterium? Really?”

But she didn’t take the bait and instead cocked her head again, searching his face for an answer. He felt her eyes roam over his features and resisted the urge to shift uncomfortably. He didn’t want her knowing what was inside his head. Before he hadn’t minded, though he had kept thoughts to himself just as she had, but now he despised the thought of her getting into his head, of taking root there.

“Would you do it again?”

He felt his forehead pucker. A low, warning growl emitted from Stelmaria’s throat. “Do what?”

“Kill for her.”

Asriel looked at her, the woman he once thought he loved, with disbelief. It felt as though he never knew her at all. “You always do this, don’t you know? You ask questions that you are already perfectly aware of the answer to.”

He knew what her real question was – she was not hiding it as well as she thought – but he didn’t give her anything more than that. He was as sure of the answer as he was of his own name, but he didn’t want to prolong this encounter by justifying himself. He knew the truth. That was all that mattered.

“You always think of yourself,” she murmured, looking away. He watched as she rebuilt her walls, papered over the cracks. It looked as though she was impenetrable, but he knew her better than that.

“You should leave,” he said. “Now. I don’t want to see you here again.”

“Why?” Again with the sickly smile but the monkey was reaching out to Stelmaria who took a few tentative steps towards him.

He was not in the mood for games. Perhaps once he used to enjoy playing them with her, enjoyed the baiting and the teasing but not anymore. Now he just wanted to go.

“You didn’t want her,” he said. “Not then and not now.”

“No, perhaps I didn’t. Perhaps I don’t.” Her voice was coy and her eyes glittered and he could understand why he’d been so careless, but he still berated himself for it. “But that’s hardly the point.”

He stepped closer to her. A mistake. More of a mistake than he could ever believe was possible. “My decision will not be changed or swayed. Whatever you use on those fools in the Church will not work on me.” He dropped his voice even lower. “I know you far too well for that.”

She almost snarled, lip curling into a cruel smile. “Oh, Asriel,” she said silkily. “You know nothing.”

He stepped even closer until her could feel her breath on his cheek. “And neither do you.”

Then he stepped back, Stelmaria stepping with him. The golden monkey looked wounded and he watched as Marisa brought her hand to her chest, as though there was a physical pain there, as though she were capable of feeling such a thing. It brought him a slither of satisfaction. There weren’t many of those these days.

“Goodbye, Marisa,” he said, and began to walk past her, Stelmaria reluctantly trailing after him.

“You should hate her,” she cried, voice loud and clear and he wondered if it was desperation that made her dare to do such a thing.

Against his better judgement he turned around. “What?”

“Lyra. You should hate her.”

“I don’t. And neither do you. Now let me leave.”

“You hate me and not her. How can that be?”

If he were to be asked, he would say that he hated Marisa, that he hated her the way he hated no other person alive. He would say that he despised her endlessly for the hurt she had inflicted upon him, the betrayal. He would say that he no longer cared, as he once might have done, whether or not she lived or died.

He would be lying.

“We’re finished,” he snapped, though it lacked its previous bite and instead sounded tired. “This conversation is over.” He turned around once again.

“Why don’t you hate her?” She begged to know, the desperation evident. He couldn’t stand it.

There was no sound for a moment. The birds kept silent and the wind stilled in the trees. It seemed as though the whole world wanted to know what he would answer.

“Because she is my daughter,” he said at last, and then he left.

**Author's Note:**

> kudos/thoughts/feelings are always more than welcome but I get you're busy beans. I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
